Monday, February 26, 2007

Monsters do not like red; or, BSC #46: Mary Anne Misses Logan

1. I could have sworn I had done this one already, but I think I just reread it before I started the blogging.

2. This cover

represented everything I thought being a teenager was about. Going rollerskating with your friends, one of whom would be wearing a fedora. Actually, I wanted to be the one with the fedora. It’s true. Plus, Mary Anne’s totally wearing mom jeans.

Okay, the plot: Dude, isn’t it obvious? Mary Anne fucking misses Logan. And there’s some super lame author project that every 8th grader has to do, and she winds up in a group with Pete Black, Logan, and Cokie Mason (who is, incidentally, totally schemin’ on Logan). La la la la. Pete and M.A. do all the work, but Logan finally pitches in at the end, just in time for them to present in front of the whole school and the author they’ve been studying. (Megan Rinehart, whom the all-knowing internet tells me doesn’t actually exist.) And Cokie totally eats it.

Okay, MA’s all, “oh, I’m missing a part of me, we knew each other so well, blah, blah, blah, whiny girlie bullshit” but they started dating in 8th grade, and they’re still in 8th grade, so how long were they together anyway? And I know, they’re thirteen (and fictional), and it’s all love and overwrought, but give me a break…

“I’m not allowed to wear really cool things, such as cowboy boots, the way most of my friends are.” Hee!

Heh. “Everyone is an individual, but Dawn is a true individual.” Also, “Dawn could probably get away with wearing a burlap bag, because she’s gorgeous."

Having younger siblings does not necessarily make you patient. Just sayin’

“Hi, by dabe is Hudter Brudo.” I hate you, ANM. That’s just dumb. And it’s always been dumb.

Oooh! Stacey fashion! “…like paisley-print leggings; a huge, long shirt; short, black, lace-up boots; and a ton of silver jewelry. She might top off the look with a black fedora.” Yup.

Claudia likes accessories (Really? I had no clue!): “T-shirt clips, slap-wrist bracelets, and for her hair, ties, beads, ribbons, combs, you name it.” Scorpions? Would she wear live scorpions in her hair? Please?

Heh, Claud thinks that they might get assigned Danielle Steele [shouldn’t that just be Steel?] or Stephen King, and everyone makes fun of her…

Dude, MA starts crying when she finds out Logan’s in her group.

Cokie flirts with Logan. A lot. And it makes MA jealous. Whoop-di-shit. [I’ve never had to spell that before.]

Shut up, Kristy, you do not know everything about child-rearing at 13. ‘Kay?

Mary Anne’s big reconciliation date outfit? An “oversized blue top and a pair of red tights.” Isn’t she supposed to be shy? As in, too shy to leave the house barely dressed?

I don't get the whole tights=leggings thing in the BSC...it's not as if they didn't actually call them leggings in other books. I always saw them as actual tights in this book, and the shirt was long enough to cover everything, like a dress. Hmmm...that doesn't really make the outfit any better, does it? :D

WHOA. T-shirt clips and slap wrist bracelets?? Helloooooooo late 80s-early 90s! *shudder* (betty sue-- I think a t-shirt clip is that thing that you pull the end of your t-shirt through so it makes a cute little bunch of fabric at your waist and it's SOOOO COOL... if you're 1990.)

I've never read this book, and now I don't really need to. Love. This. Blog.

And wtf, toilet monster? No wonder I never liked the effing Kormans. Boooooring.

HAHAHAHA. Stacey's outfit looks like something those sorority bitches would wear today. Oh how she'd fit right in with the current fashions of the year...god someone shoot whoever decided to resurrect the 80s fashion trend. It's something I don't care to repeat.

God, MaryAnne is such a whiner. She bitches about him being too controlling, and now that she has independence, she misses that control? Seriously, go get a hobby, you're pathetic to get back together with someone who used to order your damn food for you.

does anyone remember one of the stories being about a different babysitter? Not the bsc or the california group, but someone else? Am I totally making this up or does anyone else remember something like this?

Jo-- it's like how Mallory has "chesnut brown" hair when we first meet her, and then it somehow becomes red. Or perhaps how Jessi never wanted to be a professional dancer in the first books, but that's all she wants in later "years".

God, that is a stupid name. I remember that I always that Cokie was cool because she hated the BSC girls, but then in some mystery book she befriended Kristy or something because her grandmother liked her and I was disappointed again.

HA! I just read this last night. I was trying to kill some time so I went to my local used bookstore and headed straight for the BSC books. I couldn't believe Mary Anne bought Logan's feeble excuse about how he went out with Cokie because he actually missed Mary Anne. He just wanted to go out with a chick who would let him get to second base. I mean, he's a 13-YEAR-OLD BOY for fuck's sake, and Mary Anne is practically planning their damn wedding.

Wonderful blog. I was a huge nerdy BSC fan up until sixth grade or so (part of the monthly Scholastic book club too). I don't know why this knowledge has stayed with me for the past fifteen years but in regards to the cover, I'm pretty sure there was just a stock of super fun teenage goodtimes illustrations hanging around. I still recall having the BSC calendar in the early nineties. Each month was usually a cover of a BSC book in the calendar. Sometimes, it was jut a super fun teenage goodtimes illustration (which this cover happened to be, up until they used it for this book). Why I still remember this, I have absolutely no clue.

Anyway, I love the hilarious descriptions of their outfits. But from this book? It seems like Mary Kate and Ashley (and Lindsay to a lesser extent) are taking their fashion cues from Stacey and Claudia.

Hi Tiff (and everyone else reading this),I'm a student at the Columbia Journalism School and am working on a story about grown-ups who are still into their childhood books. I want to find out about your experience re-reading the books, what you got out of it, why you think these books have stuck with women so much, etc.The story is for the Columbia News Service, which is a news wire. Articles go out to 400 newspaper editors nationwide.Please e-mail me at msk2135@columbia.edu - I'd really like to talk about your BSC interest!Thanks,Melissa

Ah, I loved this book. I mean, MA is only thirteen, and she acts as if she cannot live with Logan. Like they're in love or something. You're only thirteen, Mary Anne. Oh, the Toilet Monster. Okay, that was lame. LAME.

2. The BSC girls ALWAYS wore oversized tops and leggings, so I don't see why Claudia and Stacey are continually described in every gag-worthy Chapter 2 as "sophisticated"

3. In the book where Dawn is introduced (#4, "Mary Anne Saves The Day," and page 32 for anyone too lazy to flip through it!) she (Dawn) is described: "She wasn't exactly pretty..." etc., and yet I read in this post that she can get away with wearing a burlap sack 'cause she's gorgeous? Yeah, yeah, I know picking on the continuity of THIS series (especially like 30 years later) is pointless...

4. The allergy talk makes my eyes water. Not so much because it's painfully sucking my soul out through my tear ducts as much as I remember sounding exactly like Hunter/Abby/whatever during my allergy-ridden years, and it sucked, and it sucks to be reminded of just how I sounded :p